Representation of the Party and the People

2019 is known as the “Year of the Women” as more than 60% of women were elected to the 116th Congress mostly being in the House of Representatives. In terms of representation in Congress, there are many different aspects that compare the citizens to those that represent them. In a survey from Civil Service USA, show how much representation there are for several different groups. They used categories such as Gender, Sexual Orientation, Ethnicity, Age, and religion. This comes after the 2018 midterms in which women made a record-breaking history by winning elections in their respective states. These different aspects reflect on what Zhou illustrates as “Symbolic change”, due to the idea that people vote for those that represent themselves in one way or another. However, for the representation of women, this is not the case. For example, the more women in Congress, the more likely it will be for women’s rights-based legislation will be passed. The same idea applies to minorities and LGBTQ+ for civil rights legislation. The graph below shows the entirety of Congress: 



When applying the factors of a race to show the majority (Straight White Christian Men), the graph looks more like this:


Although the 252 representatives are in the minority, this still has statistical significance when thinking about lawmaking which has that random chance of potentially making it harder to past legislation due to political affiliation. In Hall’s article, there is the concept of the “Coin-Flip”. This is when extreme candidates have the possibility of going against their party’s voting strategy causing them to do worse in general elections (as discussed in the September 23rd lecture). Analyzing the idea in comparison to the representation in Congress, the outcome could potentially become intertwined with the concept of the Double Bind Theory. The Double Bind Theory is that individuals or groups receive two conflicting messages from society on how to behave or think. Which correlates to representatives having more difficulty in acting as a trustee or delegate to the voters. Resulting in a possible misrepresentation that takes away their credibility. Losing credibility means being less apprehensive about taking incentives, especially if it does not benefit the ones they are representing in order to stay in Congress. This aspect can happen regardless of whether the member of Congress represents certain social groups. Not only do members of Congress have to concern themselves with citizens, but with their colleagues as well. Although there is more diversity in Congress, members must still abide by what their party wants, especially the speaker of the majority party. The speaker plays the biggest part in the representation of their party by needing to protect the values of said party. When it comes to the majority party having control in the House or Senate, bills are more efficiently passed and order is more regulated.  However, there is that worry in the majority party that certain laws may not best represent the people, leading to a backlash of opinions and possibly a lesser chance of reelection.





Works Cited:

Morris, S. and Adolphe, J. (2019). Does the new Congress reflect you?. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2018/nov/15/new-congress-us-house-of-representatives-senate [Accessed 18 Oct. 2019].

116th Congress by Party, Race, Gender, and Religion.” U.S. News & World Report, U.S. News & World Report, https://www.usnews.com/news/politics/slideshows/116th-congress-by-party-race-gender-and-religion?onepage.